Re: MMCs & Currents/success

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "Steven Ward by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <srward16-at-hotmail-dot-com>



>Yes, you are ok,  The RMS current rating is 14.7 amps which is just about
>what your coil will draw and the peak current may be just slightly less but
>it's ok.  I'll tell you a secret... The specs they list are about 1/2 what
>they really can handle :-))  The cap manufacturers generally use a 100%
>safety margin so people that run them a "little hot" won't have problems.


Well,

I have had success in a few areas with my coil so far.  The Capacitor was a 
success.  I could not feel any heating after a few minutes of run time.  Im 
guessing that these are pretty good caps.  Remember im using a single string 
with a 1800w PSU!!  They are GE caps, .68uf each at 1200v, i have 24 in a 
single string for .02833uf at 28.8kv.  I DID have to rebuild all of the 
parts(spark gap, safety gap) of my coil that were made on this plywood.  It 
seemed to be a bit too conductive and after a few seconds shorted and burned 
up inside.  Sooo im getting ther with the sparks.  Shamefully my best were 
about 40" from a 12" sphere.  Why so little??  well bad spark gap design 
(gaps too big so i couldnt get good quenching), and the 12" sphere is really 
small for this coil(im looking for a 18" or so now).  And it was HUMID!!!  I 
think that the coil form may have taken in some humidity as well, and as far 
as i know, humididty doesnt help coil performance.  But i guess the 
neighbors enjoyed it as they watched through the windows of their AIR 
CONDITIONED houses.  I think they liked seeing me frustrated over the humid 
weather.  So saturday night will be the next run with a new spark gap that 
has 10 gaps and the transformer alone will fire 8 of them.  This tells me 
that i probably have it set for about 19kv for the entire gap.  And this 
time the blower will be inside the gap, last time it just blew across it, 
but did a little better than i thought it would.  So my goal is 5 feet, so 
far ive easily hit 3 feet. Maybe my new spark gap will get my coil to throw 
out at least another foot.  Ill keep you all updated,

Steve Ward.

_